MINNEAPOLIS, MN.- From March 6–21, the Walker Art Center presents Women with Vision 2009: Dimensions, the 16th installment of this renowned film festival which recognizes the perspectives women bring to the art of filmmaking. This year’s festival situates us in a world interconnected by politics and global economics. With the series Views from Iran as its centerpiece, Women with Vision also includes new works made in Nepal, Korea, Holland, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Israel–all regional premieres—and the U.S. debut of the French film God’s Offices. The series also features works by two Minneapolis filmmakers, one who approaches her subject by hurtling out into space—to the sun via 3-D—and the other by zeroing in on one small locale in South Minneapolis during a protest movement. Guest filmmakers include So Yong Kim, who opens the festival with her dream-like Treeless Mountain, and Astra Taylor, who presents the witty insightful Examined Life. Whether bearing arms in Nepal’s civil war, entering the immigration fray in order to save a child, or reorganizing a village after a war, these films and the directors who made them present a world that is reshaping along human dimensions rather than political geography.

Highlights of this year’s festival include Agnès Varda’s The Beaches of Agnès (Les plages d’Agnès), the latest film from this celebrated artist, the subject of a Walker Regis Dialogue and Retrospective in 2001 (March 7, 7:30 pm); Manijeh Hekmat’s 3 Women (Sé zan) (March 11, 7:30 pm) and 7 Blind Women Filmmakers (7 Filmsaze zan-e nabina), a collection of short films (March 18, 7:30 pm), both screening as part of the Views from Iran series, which continues on successive Wednesdays through mid-April; a screening of Ayelet Menahemi’s Noodle (March 15, 1 pm), copresented with the Sabes Foundation Minneapolis Jewish Film Festival; a tribute to International Women’s Day (March 8, 1 pm), featuring a short film showcase organized by Women in Film & TV International (WIFTI) and copresented by Minnesota Women in Film & TV (MN WIFT); and the closing-night screening of Aida Begić‘s Snow (Snijeg), on Saturday, March 21, 7:30 pm.